1. Field
The present teachings relate to biological laboratory instruments and, more particularly to a system and methods for integrating large numbers of instruments and analysis applications into an automated framework.
2. Description of the Related Art
Biological analysis is often a complex process that involves many different instruments and associated analysis applications. In genomic and molecular biological studies, large numbers of samples may be processed by sequencers, fluorometers, mass spectrometers, and other instruments to provide data, indicative of the composition or expression of nucleotide or protein components comprising the sample. Captured data is subsequently provided to one of a number of different applications for further processing and analysis. The analysis applications are typically software-based and may perform such tasks as sequence determination, mutational analysis, single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) identification, etc. In certain implementations, a number of applications may be required to process the data from a variety of different samples in order to complete the analysis. These applications may be configured to operate serially wherein the resultant data output by one application is used as input for another application. When operating in this mode, the data must be properly organized and configured in the manner which is expected by each application. Typically, such operations are performed by an investigator and means to better automate the process are lacking in the industry. Likewise, parallel data processing to achieve improved throughput often requires investigator coordination, monitoring, and review thus limiting the potential to more fully automate the analysis process.
As biological laboratories become increasingly complex with more associated instruments and analysis applications, the difficulty of integrating the analysis applications and instruments into a unified system amenable to automated analysis becomes more complex. Hence, there is a need for systems and methods which permit improved integration of instruments and analysis applications in biological laboratory environment.